In 2024, healthcare supply improvement company Premier has been steadily racking up partnerships with group purchasing organizations, health systems and drugmakers. 

Rising costs in the medical supply chain are pushing health system leaders to get creative, according to Jay Kirkpatrick at Lifepoint Health and Bill Keller at HCA Healthcare. 

Memorial Hermann Health System is the latest hospital system to partner with Zipline, a drone and logistics company. 

Hospitals and health systems are constantly balancing the need to maintain focus on delivering quality care to all the patients they serve with trying to run a successful business. As shifts in site of care, evolution of payment models and patient choice drive macro changes, how do hospitals and health systems deliver quality care while maintaining financial performance?

Cardinal Health's pharmaceutical distribution contracts with OptumRx, a subsidiary of UnitedHealth Group, will not be renewed, the medical distributor said April 22. 

Medline is now a direct distributor for Epredia, a medical devicemaker that makes products for cancer and tissue diagnostics. 

The global medical supply chain is flawed and all stakeholders have a hand in these issues, according to the American Medical Association. 

Abbott and its subsidiary Thoratec Corp. warned customers of 13,883 heart devices after receiving reports of 273 injuries and 14 deaths related to blood flow obstructions. 

The FDA said U.S. healthcare workers should avoid all plastic syringes manufactured by Jiangsu Shenli Medical Production as the agency investigates multiple syringe suppliers. 

A full return to "prepandemic normalcy remains unlikely in 2024," but turbulence from supply chain disruptions is weakening, according to a new stability index. 

Medline is advancing its footprint in the health system industry, and systems are building warehouses and buying their own medical supply companies. 

With the help of Oakland, Calif.-based Kaiser Permanente, Vizient and the Sustainable Purchasing Leadership Council, the Collective Healthcare Action to Reduce MedTech Emissions launched April 9.

Business Group on Health honored five health systems and three medical supply companies with its Best Employers: Excellence in Health & Well-being Award on April 9. 

The Environmental Protection Agency finalized a rule it predicts will slash more than 6,200 tons of chloroprene and ethylene oxide emissions, which are used by chemical and medical sterilization plants. 

After the FDA handed down a sterility warning to Nurse Assist in relation to its saline and sterile water products in November, Medline recalled an unspecified number of convenience kits. 

The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania restricted Philips Respironics from producing and selling new respiratory devices from several facilities in the U.S., the FDA said April 9. 

Global Healthcare Exchange named 89 healthcare providers and supplier organizations to its 2023 Millennium Club.

Johnson & Johnson has reached a definitive agreement to acquire the cardiovascular medical device company Shockwave Medical, the drugmaker said April 5.  

In late 2022, Advocate Aurora Health and Atrium Health merged to form Charlotte, N.C.-based Advocate Health. Since then, the 67-hospital system has had to shape its supply chain road map. 

Medos International Sàrl is recalling 1,343 catheter devices because of fractures in the far end of the product, where different parts are joined together in brain vessels, the FDA said April 4.